


Where There's Smoke

by shadow_lover



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Childhood Memories, Cousin Incest, Cousins, Dragon Age Quest: In Hushed Whispers, First Kiss, Half-Brothers, Half-Sibling Incest, Incest, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-23
Updated: 2015-09-23
Packaged: 2018-04-23 00:28:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4856297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadow_lover/pseuds/shadow_lover
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being attracted to Dorian was bad enough when he thought they were just cousins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Where There's Smoke

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted [here](http://21-days.dreamwidth.org/2504.html?thread=255432#cmt255432) for 21 Days of Thedas! :)

Trevelyan's surprised to see his cousin at Redwall. Last he'd heard, the Tevinter mage was in, well, Tevinter, where he belonged. 

He's surprised, but he really shouldn't be. If there's any certainty in his life, it's that, sooner or later, Dorian Pavus will _always_ turn up.

\--

They didn't grow up together, but they saw each other once a year or so. Every year since Dorian was born. Their mothers were sisters. Trevelyan was a few years older and fascinated with his little cousin -- so bright and cheerful, and he _listened_ to Trevelyan's every word. Trevelyan had always been slight, no good with a broadsword, and it was nice to be looked up to for once. 

Every reunion they'd show off a new trick they'd learned in the interim. Dorian's were flashier, sure, fireworks in the still night sky. But despite his own talents, he seemed astonished by Trevelyan’s ability to fly a dagger into a target across the courtyard, or to appear out of smoke and nowhere behind him. 

Trevelyan turned nineteen, Dorian seventeen, and when they next met Dorian had _grown_. Sleek muscles he’d never seen on a mage before, skin dark and gleaming, there was a depth of pain and promise in his eyes that made Trevelyan weak at the knees.

And that was the summer Trevelyan's mother confessed a quiet secret to him. A heavy truth he had to carry alone with her.

His father, Bann Trevelyan, was impotent. To preserve the family name she'd lain with Halward Pavus, her sister's husband. Bann Trevelyan didn't know the betrayal, and Halward didn't know there'd been a child of their union -- though he surely suspected.

So Dorian was his half-brother as well as his cousin, and no hours kneeling in the Chantry could scrub the sin from his mind. He could only stifle the heat under shadows, shame, and smiles.

\--

“Cousin,” drawled Dorian. “It’s been _far_ too long.”

Trevelyan glanced at his companions, but apparently neither Varric nor Cassandra nor Solas saw anything amiss with Dorian’s familial attitude. All in his head, once again. He made hasty introductions, and they lost the warmth of reunion in the cold necessity of strategy.

Perhaps, as Dorian explained the situation, Trevelyan’s eyes lingered on the long lines of his bronze neck, the way his robes dipped _here_ and clung _there_. The way his back curved as he leaned over the table.

Perhaps.

\--

When he awoke in the future, he thought he’d lost everything.

The castle was a shambles, there were corpses rotting in the corners, and he couldn’t breathe for fear. Keep it together, he chanted silently, keep it together, but there was nobody to keep it together for, and he’d never been any good at doing things just for himself.

Then, a flurry of flame through the shadows. As always, when he turned around, he stumbled into Dorian, who was at last right where Trevelyan needed him to be. Without any energy left for self-restraint, Trevelyan flung himself at his cousin. His brother.

Dorian caught him like they’d rehearsed it and patted his shoulder. “Not taking this well, I see,” he said, and his gentle mockery was music to Trevelyan’s ears. “You’re all right. You’d better be, at least. Because I am _definitely_ not all right, and you’ll need to support me in this trying time.”

Trevelyan choked on a laugh, or a sob, he’d never say with. “You’re insufferable,” he whispered against Dorian’s neck.

When Dorian pressed a warm kiss to his temple, he stilled. Heart thudding.

Dorian stepped back a bit, but lifted a hand to caress Trevelyan’s face. “Is this all right?” he asked. “ _Please_ tell me it’s all right.”

Trevelyan’s entire body hummed with the need to say, yes, to lunge forward, to let himself cling to just one thing in this wide false world. Instead, because he could not bear the thought of false pretenses, he looked away.

“Oh,” said Dorian. “My apologies. No hard feelings?” His voice was warm as ever, but his hand as it left Trevelyan’s cheek was shaking.

Trevelyan knew he’d hurt him, and that-- that he couldn’t have. He caught Dorian by the wrist and looked him square in the eyes. “I want you,” he said roughly, sick to his stomach. “Or anything you’ll give me. It’s just--”

“It’s just?”

“We’re brothers. Half brothers.” You don’t want me. I’m unclean. I’m tainted by doubt and the mark on my hand and my need to hold you close and never let--

A slow grin spread across Dorian’s face, and his eyes glinted. “Oh, is that all?” he said, leaning closer. “I’ve known for years.”

A year astray in a doomed world, Trevelyan finally found himself in Dorian’s kiss.


End file.
